Finalizing Fall US tour dates and my frustration with with exorbitant ticket fees is at peak. It's like pulling teeth to have tickets available at face value, which we insist on. Being fair, some venues are fine and cooperative, but this whole practice should be illegal.For the unfamiliar, venues typically contract a ticket agency to sell their tickets for them online, and sometimes these deals require all ticket sales to go through the agency. The agencies add ticket fees on top of the face value, and kick back a percentage of the fee to the venue.
In the best case, the fees are modest, a couple of bucks, and charging a premium for the convenience of online buying seems reasonable. In bigger markets the fees can amount to an extra 30% over face value, with the venue getting on the order of 1/3 of the fee kicked back.
This is preposterous on its face, tantamount to fraud and should not be tolerated by anybody. It persists because the fiction of "face value" allows negotiation of deals with bands that *look* fair, but contain a massive hidden payout to the venue or promoter. Booking agents are complicit in this...
Because the money doesn't come out of their end. Bands are often completely in the dark about these fees so as not to rile them up, and the "face value" of tickets is at an all-time high to begin with. It's a cozy one-hand-washes-the-other arrangement between them, a very close analog to merch fees.
In both cases, if you look at the deal on paper, the band may be receiving a reasonable percentage of the gig income and the agent gets their fee from that part, but there is a hidden cost born by the audience, unaccounted and ignored that is a naked money grab by the venue.
And in the most egregious cases, tickets bought at the box office are still padded with ticket surcharges and fees. They've taken to charging you for the privilege of buying a ticket. Exactly like charging you five bucks to unlock the pump before you buy gas.
Most bands are insulated from this situation by having booking agents as intermediaries. It's only bands that get into the granular detail of their shows that even know that there are ticket fees attached, much less that their "$25" ticket actually costs a fan $34.
Hey I know it's rough out there earning a living in the arts. I'm aware. I know venues are squeezed by agents for absurd guarantees and they're looking for a way to get over, trying to find an edge. I'm aware and that's bullshit too. But it's fraudulent and reprehensible and everybody should say so.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 10 April 2024 15:18 (one month ago) link